Imagine you are a hunter-gatherer of what might be largely considered a long lost past. You are walking through a forest and there is a rustling of the leaves. Millions of years of evolution have made you sharp to this particular sound. While the sound may be caused by the wind blowing through the leaves, it can also be caused by a predator hunting for its prey - you! You become immediately alert and your breathing slows down. You have not had food for days and are on the way to forage for some when you hear this rustling of leaves.
You know the difference between the rustling of the leaves caused by the wind and the rustling caused by a predator moving stealthily towards its prey. Your mind, already a little anxious now, begins to watch out for further signs. Slowly, the breathing of the predator and its footsteps become more apparent. And instinctively you turn your eyes towards a particular direction and find yourself staring at a wolf! Then something truly magical happens! Despite having not eaten decent food for days, a rush of energy comes in and you start running towards safety. Where did your energy come from?
Cortisol is a naturally occurring hormone in your body. And when faced with danger or the notion of danger, your body's balanced production of cortisol goes out for a toss and your levels of cortisol rise. These elevated levels of cortisol divert the focus of your body towards processing your reserve stores of energy and making them available. It is by this availability of energy (blood glucose) that you are able to find a sudden source of energy which allows your 'fight or flight' response.
And thank goodness this happens! Else in the slightest face of danger we would continue to gallop around like idiots and any predator, animate or inanimate, will have us where it wants and we wouldn't survive too long. But good things are good only if they come at the right place and at the right time. An unseasonal rain might be a welcome sight but can wreck havoc on the delicate balance of nature. Same way, imagine that your levels of cortisol were always elevated! What would happen?
When cortisol kicks into action, it completely changes the priorities of your body. It may slow down your digestive processes, your growth and healing processes and may even compromise your immune system. The focus is on giving you enough energy to escape the situation. But imagine there is no situation. Then not only is your body being denied a healthy occurrence of various processes but you are not 'fighting or flighting' and using these excess energy. We call it 'high sugar' in our casual conversations.
Some people suffer from disorders such as Cushing's Syndrome aka hypercortisolism. They are doomed to suffer its consequences unless medical intervention is available. But there are those among us who are voluntarily submitting to a condition of elevated cortisol and its associated problems.
Are you anxious? Er ... no, you might say, giving a broad convincing smile. Are you sure? Oh ... of course, comes the reply. And then you glance over to your side where your phone has been kept. No sooner had the waiter brought your exotic dish than you had taken a photograph of it and uploaded it to your Facebook wall, and sent it out to your Whatsapp friends. The LED on the top of the phone which starts glowing when a new notification has arrived, is not blinking.
You turn your gaze and look at your friend again with whom you are having lunch. A few moments later, you are looking again at your phone. You cannot resist and you quickly grab your phone and open Whatsapp. A double blue tick on your close friend's chat window. She has read your message! Strange. Why hasn't she replied? What could be wrong? Ah, what about your other friend? A double grey tick - she still hasn't seen the message. Hmmm! Ok. Another friend, double blue and no reply! What? Why?
You turn back to your friend and he is not at all pleased. He is meeting you after such a long time and here you are, more anxious about potential comments from your friends over a picture you took of a dish. The conversation turns sour and dull. Your friend quickly wraps up the lunch and then excuses himself for wanting to go elsewhere for another appointment. You feel bad, of course, since you are in general a good human being and also completely aware that your friend is a little upset. You come back home with a double dose of worries and in that trance fail to ackowledge your waiting parents who are eager to share something with you. Now they are upset and the chain goes on!
This is self-inflicted hypercortisolism!
It's bad enough that modern work places are sources of stress and anxiety and here you have to inflict more on yourself. And if you think this is not messing up your levels of cortisol, think again. And then ask yourself - what kind of an idiot inflicts such a condition on one's body? Well, then stare at yourself in the mirror and hope that you are not that idiot.
There are obvious solutions in the form of exercise and Yoga. These physical activities help manage cortisol levels as well as the associated changes produced in the body because of elevated levels of cortisol. But here are my personal suggestions apart from obvious.
Guided meditation in the middle of the action. Plenty of podcasts, Youtube videos and apps exist which provide guided meditations of various lengths. Try to find a quiet place and do these.
Tomato meters! The Pomodoro technique suggests slicing your day in cycles of 25 minute bursts of non-distracted work followed by mandatory 5 minute breaks. I follow this less for productivity but more for the mandatory breaks.
Shutting down the Internet on the phone for prolonged periods on specific days.
Having a real hobby to pursue during free times. If you love it, following the previous idea becomes trivial.
Disable mobile data when meeting up with real people.
Meet more real people and invest more time with them.
I am sure there are many more methods out there. But to provide an exhaustive list is not the intention of this post. This post is to bring out the severe danger that lies in self inflicted stress and the necessity to acknowledge its presence. Once acknowledged, it becomes easier to solve the problem. Beware of the killer named anxiety!